Leave your feedback Share Copy URL https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/afghan-expert-riedel-weighs-obamas-strategic-options Email Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Pinterest Tumblr Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Transcript Former CIA officer and terrorism expert Bruce Riedel discusses his book, "The Search for Al Qaeda: Its Leadership, Ideology, and Future" and his work chairing an Afghanistan policy review for the Obama administration. Read the Full Transcript Notice: Transcripts are machine and human generated and lightly edited for accuracy. They may contain errors. JIM LEHRER: That follows more on Afghanistan. And we go to Margaret Warner for that. U.S. PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA: I want to thank Bruce Riedel — Bruce is down at the end here — who has worked extensively on our strategic review. MARGARET WARNER: When President Obama unveiled his first strategy for Afghanistan and Pakistan last March, Bruce Riedel was there. He chaired the high-level review that recommended a broad counterinsurgency campaign in the region against al-Qaida.Riedel spent a lifetime studying that terrorist group and its roots through three decades at the CIA, with postings to top jobs at the Pentagon and the National Security Council. Last year, he released a book, "The Search for Al Qaeda: Its Leadership, Ideology and Future."I spoke with him today at the Brookings Institution, where he's a senior fellow.Bruce Riedel, thank you for being with us.BRUCE RIEDEL, former CIA official: It's a pleasure. MARGARET WARNER: You chaired the interagency review that led the first Obama Afghan/Pakistan strategy. It appears now that Afghanistan may be going to a runoff election. Do you think that is a good thing, or does that further complicate things? BRUCE RIEDEL: I think, on the whole, it is a good thing, because a second round offers the opportunity to put legitimacy into the Afghan political system. But it's got to be a second round that fixes the mistakes of the first round, no more ghost polling stations, no more fraud, no more corruption.And that means the U.N. and the international community needs to be far more involved in this runoff election than it was in handling the first election. MARGARET WARNER: Now, how does, meanwhile, the intensified violence in Pakistan, how does that further complicate the picture for the president? BRUCE RIEDEL: Well, the situation in Pakistan today is extremely volatile, very combustible, and very fluid. The good news is that the Pakistani people seem to have finally recognized that the jihadists are a threat to their freedoms.And the good news is also that the Pakistani army is now taking on the jihadists in a real way. It's critical, with the Pakistanis finally doing these things, that we send the signal of resolve and determination across the border. MARGARET WARNER: You mean in Afghanistan? BRUCE RIEDEL: Exactly.